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English
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Part 1 of madness (eggpire!tommy au)
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Things to fuel my escapism.
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Published:
2022-09-24
Words:
883
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1/1
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15
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338
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20
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3,341

in your homeland they all call you queen

Summary:

I know you, Tommy Innit, the whisper tells him, startling him once more. Don’t be afraid.
The moment he hears the whisper, of course, both he and the server are doomed. But a frog never realizes the water’s boiling until it’s already dead.

After the prison confrontation but before Wilbur leaves, the Egg returns, and Tommy isn't immune anymore.

Notes:

title: ruby - twenty one pilots

sooo i wrote this one a little after stranger things s4 dropped. something something vecna vibes. that's it

edit (oct 15 2022): added formatting

(See the end of the work for more notes.)

Work Text:

It starts, as not many things do, with a whisper.

The morning of the end, Tommy Innit goes through the motions, groggy and exhausted. He has been sleeping less and less, lately, though for what reason he cannot tell. His head has been pounding for the last few days. He feeds his pet spider, Shroud, and he makes himself a shitty bowl of shitty, slightly-expired off-brand cereal he got at a clearance a few days before. He makes sure not to wake Wil, who has been crashing on his couch since the latest of their confrontations with Dream, which involved several threats of suicide, a dash of emotional manipulation and a lot of anger and grief and betrayal—and of course, his cursed discs. If he were anyone else, Tommy would have long since turned his back on his brother; if he were anyone else, Tommy would’ve abandoned the server entirely, taking only his spider and perhaps two or three of his potted flowers with him. 

He’s not anyone else. He’s Tommy, and unfortunately for him, it’s already too late to escape what’s coming his way, though he doesn’t know this yet. 

It starts, then, as he’s sitting down on his porch, eating his cereal in his pajamas, taking in the summer morning chill. He thinks, for just a moment, I should put on some music. Maybe Cat. When he goes to stand up, though, and takes a single step towards his Ender chest, he hears the whisper. 

Aren’t you exhausted?

Tommy turns around immediately, but there’s no one there. His heart is hammering against his ribcage; it didn’t sound like Dream, but anything’s possible these days. “Hello? Who the fuck is there?!”

I know you, Tommy Innit, the whisper tells him, startling him once more. Don’t be afraid. 


The moment he hears the whisper, of course, both he and the server are doomed. But a frog never realizes the water’s boiling until it’s already dead. 


When Wilbur wakes up that morning, Tommy is gone. He doesn’t think too much of it—Tommy is always gone by the time Wilbur wakes up, anyway. Tubbo doesn’t realize anything unusual either, as he’s too occupied reselling Ranboo’s old things to whoever’s willing to buy them. Everyone else is busy, distant. 

Back in the desert, Eret and Foolish have a chat over brunch; both of them artfully avoid mentioning the death between them, the reasons for it. Far away, Bad is still recovering, living with Ant, as is Sam; Skeppy is nowhere to be found. Hannah Rose sees her flowers regain their beautiful red gloss and she smiles at them with pride. Ponk, finally, has found a place to settle. Punz is gods know where with Dream, though no one else knows about this. Quackity, at Las Nevadas, is making sure everything keeps running smoothly. Captain Puffy looks at an old shipwreck and presses her lips tightly. 

Everyone is too preoccupied to notice. On a surface level, it simply seems like yet another day on the Dream SMP—another hot summer day, tense and lonely yet still tentatively peaceful, nothing beyond the usual threat of danger. 

At six in the morning, Tommy Innit leaves his home in his pajamas. He leaves behind a half-empty bowl of soggy cereal, and brings with him a single iron pickaxe at half durability. No one notices he’s missing until that night, when Wilbur realizes the kid never returned and checks his comms, fearing a death message, only to find absolute radio silence. He alerts the server, to little interest (it is Tommy, after all); it is only the day after that people begin to take Wilbur’s increasingly-frantic messages seriously. 

At five thirty in the morning, Tommy Innit hears a whisper. A call. At six, he’s gone.

At six ten, Tommy is underground, carving his way through obsidian and nether brick. Finally he breaks through into a massive overgrown cavern. He drops the pickaxe and crawls inside, and as he staggers forward he feels warm, and comforted, and very nearly like sobbing. 

Hello, the whisper says, all sweetness and ichor. Oh, dearheart. Look at you. You’re perfect. 

His head hurts, and he’s having a very hard time making sense of anything. All he hears is the whisper; all he sees is beauty, safety, peace for once. He trips against a root and scrapes his arms, but everything is heavy, and he can’t move anymore. He doesn’t even try to. 

You’re so precious, the whisper promises. You couldn’t hear me before, could you? Oh, you must’ve felt so alone. Hands brush against his hair, and someone rubs his back. Tommy sobs at the contact like he’s a famished man tasting grenadine. I’ve got you, dearheart. You don’t need to worry ever again. I’ll keep you safe. 

At ten, Wilbur Soot walks outside Tommy’s home and accidentally steps on a bowl of abandoned cereal. The milk splatters everywhere. Wilbur rolls his eyes. 

“Really, Tommy?” 

Wilbur moves on with his day. The jukebox next to Tommy’s bench is silent, but only because Cat has already finished its course—not like anyone notices until it is far too late. 

Deep underground, the Egg cradles its new Prince in a cocoon of red, and Tommy dreams, strangely unburdened, as the vines wrap themselves into his injuries. 

Notes:

ayo thx for reading

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